


Come home

by Ibbyliv



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Break Up, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing in the Rain, M/M, Reconciliation, Sadness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-13
Updated: 2013-10-13
Packaged: 2017-12-29 07:53:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1002866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ibbyliv/pseuds/Ibbyliv
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes the phone rings. Sometimes his stomach leaps again, like it used to every time Grantaire called to talk about their silly little dates.</p><p>
  <em>Hey...</em>
</p><p>“Hey Enjy, you still there?”</p><p>He’s still here.</p><p>“You can’t stay in that apartment forever. I’m coming with Combeferre to pick you up. How does a movie night at my place sound? Like the good old times? Promise it won’t be an American Pie marathon!”</p><p>Painful, Courfeyrac. It sounds painful. Getting into clothes sounds painful.</p><p>“Fun. It sounds fun.”</p><p>He hangs up with a click.</p><p>
  <em>Hey, I just wanted to hear your voice.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>It was all I wanted.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Come home

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by One Republic's 'Come Home'.  
> No plot, just sadness. Terribly OOC. I'm sorry.  
> Also my newest obsession happened. Long hair Grantaire because why not.

It’s a nice couch. Comfortable. Good looking. He was right to have insisted on buying the cream one instead of the yellow Courfeyrac was suggesting.

It’s comfortable, nice. The leather is soft. A little slippery but soft, and smells nice… Leathery.

The view of the TV is quite good from this couch. It’s a new TV, not very big but nice. He supposes. He never owned one until Grantaire laughed because he lived like a monk.  

His fingertips slide a little over the crushed creamy leather. It’s soft. It smells of Grantaire. Or Grantaire smelt of it every time they sat here, curled together, watching movies. He still remembers the first time, their first disastrous date after a political debate, an epic fight, a violent kiss and a food poisoning when they ended up wrapped sitting on this couch frozen, as if turning their heads to stare at each other would burn them alive or cause the world to explode. Their fingers had slowly entwined. He still remembers the shiver their touch sent through his spine, after all the months of denial and of desperate efforts to pretend that he didn’t care for him. The living room was dark then, their features only lit by the blue reflection of the TV as they watched _Brokeback Mountain._ He hated that movie. He hated the way they treated each other. In the end he realized that tears had swelled on Grantaire’s eyes. He hated how melancholic the movie made him, he hated the endless cyclone of thoughts he could literally see passing behind those pale, blue glance yet knew nothing about them. “Stupid,” Grantaire had croaked.

“Stupid,” Enjolras had nodded. He didn’t know to what exactly he was agreeing. Everything and everyone seemed stupid, and most of all himself who wasn’t holding Grantaire in his arms, running his fingers through his knotted, wild locks and keeping him safe and happy and comforted. So he did. Their lips met again and it was slow and beautiful. A smile had appeared on those cynical, thin lips, a smile so different from those driven by sarcasm, those which didn’t quite reach his eyes.

He’s alright. He’s fine. He still has the couch, he can read a book. He had secretly wished for some free time to read a book for so long.

He reads a book. Grantaire always sketched while resting his head on his lap when he read a book. His lap is empty. He’s a little cold.

It’s alright.

It’s a nice couch.

*

He’s quite pleased with the amount of light that enters his apartment every afternoon, when Paris decides to be sunny. The curtains are thin and creamy, minimalistic and stylish enough to match with the couch. One can always count on Combeferre when he needs help with interior design. The streaks of light filtered through the curtains falls straight on the wooden floor and he can see the clouds of dust dancing and swirling restlessly in it. He never had a problem with working himself hard. He never had a problem with denying himself any kind of luxury or entertainment, driving Courfeyrac to hysterics, not to mention rest, making it Joly and Combeferre’s turn to fret. He spent endless sleepless nights working on some project or an article.

Suddenly he wishes he could take a break. He isn’t tired. He just is annoyed at the dust that never stops swirling. He wishes the dust would freeze midair in the way he wants to freeze life. Just for a while. Just a break, just a moment. Please, make the world stop turning for a moment, he needs to lie back on the couch and stare at the ceiling, why can’t you take a break from life every now and then?

This sounds like something Grantaire would say.

Grantaire used to place his easel on that very spot of the living room, for the sun to gently stroke his paintings. He used to watch him work from that very spot on the couch with his laptop on his knees, his hair, face and clothes covered in paint, biting his lower lip in concentration. He always painted so beautifully.

He’s alright. Only the dust keeps dancing.

And dancing.

*

Grantaire danced. He got up in ungodly hours of the afternoon or the midnight and put on his funky jazz and rock-and-roll, pissing the fuck out of the neighbors. He let his black curls loose and he swayed his hips in his tight black jeans in a way that should be illegal, an evil grin on his face. Enjolras snapped. He needed to concentrate on his work. He needed silence. He had a headache. Grantaire was annoying. Grantaire was noisy.

Enjolras didn’t mind. Not really.

Sometimes Grantaire grabbed his hands and pulled him up. Enjolras groaned and protested. Grantaire threw his arms around his waist and forced him to sway with him. Enjolras would soon relax. He was a terrible dancer. Grantaire led the way, pressing their waists and hips together. Enjolras rested his head on his shoulder and Grantaire breathed dirty sweet nothings in his ears.

Now only the dust dances, and the world doesn’t stop.

*

He still remembers the period before Grantaire moved in. He remembers their innocent little dates in cafés and bars around town –Grantaire knew all the best places in Paris. He remembers the way his stomach leaped every time the phone rang, as if they were inexperienced teenagers.

Sometimes the phone rings. Sometimes his stomach leaps again.

All the time.

Sometimes his heart jumps in his chest.

_All the time._

He likes how the phone feels between his fingers. Plastic. Cold. Glossy against his ear.

_“Fuck your oppression! We’re watching Despicable Me at the cinema.”_

_“Have you eaten anything all day? Good, thought so. We’re having pasta. My place. Bring lube. And pyjamas. I’ll be in my onesie and bunny slippers, covered in chocolate.”_

_“Hey. It’s still on for tonight, right?”_

_“Come oooon, Enj! You’re nooo fun when you’re sober!”_

_“Hey, how does a stroll by the Seine sound to you?”_

_“I’ll be there in five, Apollo.”_

_“Hey.”_

_Hey, I just wanted to hear your voice._

_Hey._

“Hey Enjy, you still there?”

He’s still there.

“You can’t stay in that apartment forever. I’m coming with Combeferre to pick you up. How does a movie night at my place sound? Like the good old times? Promise it won’t be an American Pie marathon!”

Painful, Courfeyrac. It sounds painful. Getting into clothes sounds painful.

“Fun. It sounds fun.”

He hangs up with a click.

_Hey. I just wanted to hear your voice._

_It was all I wanted._

*

He had always felt pleased with his bed. Spacious, soft, warm. The blanket is warm and red. He loves that blanket. So soft and warm and red.

He opens his eyes slowly and looks around. No sun is entering through the transparent curtains today. The sky is clouded. The weather is cold. He’s lucky he has the blanket.

They used to wake up in much sunnier mornings underneath that blanket. In much cloudier too. It never was really cold. They always slept in nothing but their boxers, except when they were sick when Grantaire wore the oldest, heaviest red hoodies he owned, and Enjolras the lightest paint-stained t-shirts. In the night when he’d feel cold, he’d unconsciously reach for Grantaire and cling on him. Their limbs would tangle together, their foreheads would meet and their fingers entwine. There were nights when Grantaire didn’t want to talk, didn’t want to smile. Enjolras would then wrap his arms around his waist and press his chest against his back. Grantaire wouldn’t move, but they both knew he felt better.

He woke up every morning to find Grantaire staring at him with blue eyes full of adoration, as if he was an angel fallen from heaven. “You were snoring,” he would say in the weekdays, his voice heavy and hoarse from sleep, with a raised eyebrow and they would always fight because Enjolras _never_ snored. Enjolras threw himself up and rushed to the shower to leave for work. When he finished his shower and returned in the room Grantaire was breathing peacefully, having fallen asleep again. Enjolras got dressed on the tips of his toes, trying to be silent to not wake him up.

On the weekends Grantaire would raise first and chuckle “Good morning sunshine,” trying to get up in order to make coffee. Enjolras would then wrap his arms like tentacles around him and never let him leave, making muffled, sleepy sounds. They spent the whole morning in bed. It was warm.

It’s a nice red blanket. Warm. Soft.

It’s a nice bed. Big.

Spacious.

Empty.

*

The first time Grantaire told him he loved him they were in the kitchen. Grantaire spent a fair amount of time in the kitchen when he was well and sober and the days sunny and the evenings clear. He cooked the most amazing plates while Enjolras was still at work, meat and chicken and potatoes and eggs and the most bizarre, spicy sauces. The image was still vivid. Grantaire was always in an apron and a pair of sweatpants, his bare feet thumping rhythmically on the piles as he walked, his strong arms and bare shoulder blades peeking under the ties of the apron, a mischievous smile on his face while he did his magic. Orgasmic scents filled the apartment.

His favorite part of the weekends was when he found him in the kitchen, in an old ratty t-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts, his cheeks raw and unshaven, his dark long hair tousled from bed and pulled on a messy bun, making coffee for the two of them. Enjolras would surprise him from behind, slowly slide his hands over the t-shirt and rest them on his chest, over his thumping heart. Grantaire would shift his head a little and Enjolras would notice a faint smile. He smelt of coffee and toothpaste and sometimes he drank orange juice right after brushing his teeth.

Enjolras hated that.

Not really.

He kissed him, lazily, sloppily, hands resting on his waist and fingers sliding through his hair.

Sometimes he really hated it. “You’re disgusting,” he’d groan and sit on the table, spreading his newspaper in front of him.

Grantaire eyed him, resting lazily against the counter in the same, sarcastic manner Enjolras always hated.

“I love you,” he said one morning, his expression lit by a hint of humor. Was it mocking? Was it truth?

Enjolras did not reply.

The coffee leaves a horrible aftertaste in his mouth. Grantaire smoked. The cigarette always left a terrible aftertaste in his mouth. He hated it when they kissed after smoking. Enjolras never smoked.

He smokes a cigarette. Then another.

He never drinks orange juice after brushing his teeth.

*

They made love everywhere. On the kitchen table, on the carpeted floor, against the cold wall, fuckin' fiercely against the mattress. The sheets smelt faintly of flowers. The sex smelt of cigarettes and beer and coffee and fresh ink. _Their_ smells. It tasted of intimacy, sometimes soft sometimes wild. They made slow, passionate love as Grantaire huskily breathed his various, horrible nicknames. They fucked savagely, hands hungry for burning skin and lips greedy for biting and leaving purplish marks on it, and he cried Grantaire’s name. He didn’t mind staring the neighbors in the eye the next morning. He was proud, filled with a wild, twisted sort of enthusiasm. He felt Grantaire on him, _inside him_ all day, every minute that he spent in the office or in Combeferre's place before he returned home.

Grantaire breathed “I love you” on his skin, sometimes aloud, some others just touching him that way. He told him he loved him again and again and waited for nothing in return. He just wanted to show him, to let him know. He never looked ashamed of saying it even though Enjolras knew that the man still couldn't believe they were together.

Sometimes Enjolras would return, torn and in pieces from the work he hated and Grantaire would undo his smart tie and unbutton his crisp white shirt. Lust and admiration for him were always engraved on his blue eyes, as he touched his shoulders, massaged them and released him from the knots and stiffness of a hard day at work. They would make love again and again and Grantaire would moan how he loved him. While he kissed him. When he entered him. At the top of his climax. In his arms, covered in a shiny layer of sweat, after they tried to catch their breath.

Enjolras never told him he loved him back. He didn’t want to. He didn’t know if he wanted to.

Grantaire would mutter drowsily how he loved him when they were ready to drift to sleep, wrapped in each other’s embrace. Enjolras’ fingertips would trace along his collarbone, his ribs, his waist and hipbones. His eyes would slide shut and he’d sleep with a smile on his face.

He never told him.

*

He picked his wardrobe from IKEA with Combeferre. He hated the idea of going to IKEA. Courfeyrac had been teasing him all along of building barricades with the furniture in the middle of the corridors and protest for the conditions under which these furniture were created, and Enjolras had almost thought of proving his friend true.

It is a stupid wardrobe. It has a stupid name, at least. FJELL. It isn’t stupid, not really. Just the name. It’s a nice wardrobe. The wood looks natural, raw and callused beneath his fingers. He opens one of the two sheets. His suit. His sweaters and cardigans and jackets, his jeans and red trousers. The rest of it is empty.

It doesn’t bother him. It used to be empty when he bought it.

He remembers the day when he told Grantaire to bring a pair of jeans, then his pajamas. He remembers the surprise and bewilderment on the man’s face, the way his pale blue eyes had opened widely as if he was afraid to believe that he was suggesting him to bring his stuff.

Then came a few t-shirts. A cardigan. A couple of hoodies. More jeans. His army boots. Enjolras always protested for the army boots. They were scruffy and dirty and filled the floor with mud. He remembers how he’d rolled his eyes at Grantaire’s favorite onesie.

It’s empty now. It doesn’t bother him.

Only a t-shirt is forgotten behind. Huge, baggy, paint-stained.

Enjolras’ fingers are trembling before they curl around the fabric.

He brings it to his face. It smells of Grantaire, so much that it’s laughing at him. It smells so strongly, as if a Grantaire cologne exists in the market and Courfeyrac found it funny to buy it and empty half the bottle on one of the paint-stained, baggy t-shirts that Grantaire left in the wardrobe. His head feels heavy, numb. His cheeks are burning. His chest is cold. His heart is pounding. Rhythmically. Monotonously. He buries his face in the t-shirt. He inhales in the scent. His stomach ties into a heavy knot. A lump settles on his throat.

He pushes the t-shirt over his neck. He’s wearing Grantaire, yet Grantaire isn’t here. He’s touching him yet he’s already left. His chest aches. A piece of him is ripped apart. His heart is burning with pain. He caresses the fabric hanging loosely over his belly. He’s empty. The t-shirt feels empty even though he’s wearing it.

Burning tears swell on his eyes and never fall.

*

He remembers of Grantaire’s art exhibition, less than a month ago. He had much work to finish at the office and it seemed like an added burden. He had to make plans about the meeting of their group. He had rushed to the exhibition because he knew he had to but his mind wasn’t there. He was thinking of the work he had to finish when he’d get home. It wasn’t that he didn’t care for Grantaire’s work. He loved his art, he knew that he was extremely talented. He just had seen everything already while Grantaire worked on it. Plus he never really understood art, no matter how hard he tried.

After a while he was apologizing, Grantaire was smiling half-heartedly yet his eyes had lighted up and he was assuring him that it was alright, he made it, he came, it was alright, he loved him.

Only Enjolras didn’t say it back.

And then he saw that room, a room full of breathtaking paintings in red and gold and white, halos of blond hair and marble skin and burning fire on red lips. A flag and flames, and always the same burning eyes. “I didn’t know,” was all he whispered.

Grantaire simply shrugged his shoulders, trying to hide a smile.

Their hands clasped tightly and Enjolras looked at him staring back from everywhere around him.

*

He doesn’t even remember how the fight started. He knows it was Grantaire’s fault. It had been his fault all along.

He’s in the shower. The piles underneath his bare feet are cold, but the water that falls on his sore muscles and soothes his tired skin is warm. Drops are falling on his eyelashes, nose and lips. He tastes the water as it drips from his soaked hair, plastered on his scalp. It will make him feel better. A shower always made him feel better.

He’s fine, really. He’s fine.

He just wants to feel better. A little.

He hears the water as it pours with pressure on the piles. He shuts his eyes, he can’t stare at the sink where Grantaire’s toothbrush joined his own a few months ago, and soon was followed by his shaving machine. He can’t stare at the toilet where he found Grantaire throwing up violently numerous evenings, after trying to drink himself into oblivion. Grantaire was dark those nights, dark like that circles underneath his eyes. Grantaire was distant. Grantaire was lonely. He didn’t let him in.

The water pours and yet somehow it doesn’t make him feel better. He remembers of that night, when Grantaire was more distant and lonely and dark than ever. He remembers leading him gently in the shower and holding him in his arms as if he was a baby, pouring shower gel in his palms and washing him slowly, almost tenderly, feeling the sorrows draining away from his naked, vulnerable body, being washed away and sliding together with the warm water that ran in the small holes of the drain.

It’s his fault. He doesn’t care.

If only he’d told him, just once. If only he pushed his pride aside and admitted how he loved him with every fiber of his being, so much that it hurt, so much that he wanted to get out in the balcony and shout it for all of Paris to know…

Then maybe, just _maybe,_ things would be different. Grantaire always told him he loved him without waiting for anything in return. If only he’d let it out of his chest, if only he'd let him know too…

The water pours and he can’t remember how the fight started. He can’t remember yet he knows, deep inside he _knows_ it was his fault.

Yet there’s nothing he can do about it. Grantaire has left home. He’ll never walk in this shower again with him, barefoot, naked, uncovered and revealed before his eyes, he’ll never laugh with adoration and wash his blond hair with devotion.

The water pours and washes the burning tears streaming down Enjolras’ cheeks away. He’s alright. He’s fine. This place never belonged to Grantaire anyway.

Yet the water doesn’t help, neither does the faint scent of the coconut shampoo Grantaire used to tease him for. Not today.

He walks out and wraps himself in a towel. He’s shivering at the chilly air of the bathroom as the steam slowly melts away on the misty mirror. He remembers how Grantaire hated that mirror, how he hated watching his reflection on it. Grantaire always thought he was ugly, yet Enjolras could never quite understand him. Grantaire was beautiful, so beautiful that the mirror wasn't worth him.

He’s crying. Enjolras is crying and cannot help it anymore. He’s sitting on the cap of the toilet, the towel wrapped around his waist and he’s crying tears of redemption and catharsis and remorse because he _knows_ it was his fault, and Grantaire isn’t coming back.

_I love you._

He never told him.

_I just wanted to hear your voice._

It’s all he wants.

_I just want to tell you I love you._

It’s all he needs.

He throws on a red hoodie and slips in his jeans and a pair of sneakers. He grabs his coat and wraps it around his shoulders. The familiar sound of the pouring water is echoing in the sky as he steps outside the apartment, it’s like he never left his shower.

It’s raining.

It’s raining and Enjolras is running. His heart is pounding in his chest and his insides ache violently, his every cell is burning with a pain that can’t be healed and he’s running in the rain. His hair is still wet and only covered by the already soaked hood of his sweatshirt. Grantaire will never know. It’s too late.

He will never know.

His feet lead him as if he knows where to find him. His shoes trip in holes full of water and he’s dripping wet when he sees the glorious lights of the Notre Dame, misty in the rain. He’s running by the side of the Seine where the waters of the skies become one with the waters in history books.

And then he sees him.

He’s leaning by the Seine, staring into the water. Enjolras' breath hitches on his throat at the familiar sight of the green hoodie that covers his long, black hair is soaked wet, his shoulders slumped and he can recognize the bottle wrapped between his fingers as he stares to nowhere. Enjolras stops. His heart is about to burst out of his chest.

And then he’s walking, slowly, carefully, as if he’s trying not to scare a small animal away. He’s walking by the Seine as the rain becomes a storm and the skies open. There’s water everywhere, on his eyelids and nose and cheeks, in his hoodie and jeans and in his shoes, there’s water in his mouth but he doesn’t care because the night is dark and Grantaire is here and his heart is hammering madly in his chest.

Grantaire slowly turns his head. Enjolras' eyes meet with his pale blue ones. He looks tired, dark and thin. His cheeks are hollow and unshaven, his damp curls plastered on the sides of his face, his glance steel, shadowy and empty.

Enjolras’ pulse is pounding madly in his head as he makes a step closer in the rain. His lips part only he doesn’t know what he’s saying. It might be an “I’m sorry”. It might be a “You’re here.” It might as well be a “Please, listen to me” or an “I want to talk”.

All that he knows is that Grantaire parts his own lips with a painful expression and mutters hoarsely: “What are you doing here?”

Enjolras remembers of the times he’d wished the world would stop turning, and then it suddenly does. The world is not turning anymore, only rain is pouring and he makes another step closer and his heart thumps irregularly in his chest and his fingers wrap around Grantaire’s arms and he’s saying it, no, he’s _shouting_ it because he can, he never could but now he can and he’ll do it, if it’s the last thing he’ll ever do.

“I love you.”

Grantaire’s expression remains blank and Enjolras’ heart sinks lower and lower but then he feels the man's arms relaxing beneath his grip and Enjolras is pulling him to a kiss, he feels him shaking like a leaf with cold and bewilderment in his embrace but he doesn’t let him go, he holds him close even if it means it’s the last time and kisses him fiercely, tasting the rain from his cynical lips and feeling his bitter heart fluttering between their pressed bodies.

“Come home,” he whispers when they part and he’s crying, he never cried in front of Grantaire but he’s crying now and he's pressing his lips against his forehead and pleading with every breath, with every raindrop.

_Come home._

And suddenly Grantaire’s blue eyes are lit by the hint of a spark and he smiles softly and Enjolras can see the river of raindrops _and maybe tears_ running from his face. “Your hair is wet,” he breathes. “You’ll catch a cold.” His fingertips are faintly touching Enjolras’ cheek as if he can’t believe he’s real. “Let’s go home.”

Their fingers entangle and they pull over their hoods. The rain doesn’t stop.

They’re going home.


End file.
